Southwest Sees Record Profit for Q4 2017

Southwest Airlines announced financial results for the fourth quarter of 2017.

The airline reported record fourth quarter net income of $1.888 billion, a 261.7% increase over Q4 2016.

The airline also set a record for fourth-quarter operating revenue, reporting $5.3 billion, a year-over-year increase of 3.9%.

Southwest’s passenger revenue per available seat mile, or Prasm, increased 0.5%, up to 12.50 cents.

Passenger traffic in the fourth quarter increased by 2.6%, up to 32.19 billion revenue passenger miles, or RPMs, from 31.136 billion in the fourth quarter of 2016. Meanwhile, capacity also increased, up 2% to 37.887 billion available seat miles, or ASMs, from 37.147 billion ASMs last year.

The big news in the hotel world was the 2017 opening of the Gran Hotel Manzana Kempinski in Havana, the city’s first proper grande dame of a hotel to open in the island nation. Located in the historic Manzana de Gómez building, Cuba’s first shopping mall in the center of Old Havana, the hotel is truly in a class of its own.
An oasis in a city that’s somewhat crumbling and …

A more complete story of how a Horizon Air employee was able to steal, fly, and subsequently crash an aircraft taken from Seattle-Tacoma International Airport Friday evening is beginning to emerge as details come to light.
Richard B. Russell flew a Bombardier Dash 8 – Q400 turboprop plane for almost an hour over Puget Sound, even performing aerobatics, until it crashed on Ketron Island, off the shore of Steilacoom. Mr. Russell, …